Professionals worst at people management

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Lawyers, accountants, architects and engineers have the worst
people management styles, says a nationwide report from headhunters
and human resource consultant Hudson.

In a survey of 7600 human resources managers and line managers,
50.1 per cent of respondents said professional services firms were
poor people managers.

Next worst were health-care organisations including hospitals,
radiologists and pathologists (47.3 per cent), followed by
non-profit organisations (45.6 per cent) such as charities and
member organisations.

However, companies in the advertising marketing and media sector
did not come up that well, either. According to the survey, they
were the worst at checking the effectiveness or otherwise of their
managers - 62.2 per cent of respondents in these companies said no
one had assessed their management and leadership competencies.

Managers in the education sector fared little better on this
issue, at 61.3 per cent.

Hudson Capital Solutions division general manager David Reynolds
said part of the problem was that most professional services and
health-care companies promoted their best technicians as
managers.

"Many of the people in leadership positions are there because of
their professional skills and a lot of their training is around
technical skills, not people management," Mr Reynolds said. This
was one reason these companies traditionally had high staff
turnover.

"They are seen as a training ground for the technical skills and
there is something about the culture that doesn't allow the people
to be developed differently," he said.

But the Hudson report found that poor people management was a
feature across all sectors. The utilities sector was the only
standout.

Only half the managers (51.3 per cent) were assessed for their
leadership and management competencies. Most of the time this was
done through performance appraisals, a method of assessment that
does not test for higher potential roles.

The report also found that 14 per cent of respondents had not
undertaken formal leadership development programs at their
workplace.